Who’s up, who’s down, and who’s tanking: 5 takeaways from the latest campaign finance reports

President Joe Biden kicked his once-sleepy campaign into gear. Donald Trump doubled up his GOP competitors. And Ron DeSantis started watching his wallet.

The final Federal Election Commission filing deadline of 2023 passed early Monday morning, with the candidates providing a last peek behind the curtain of their campaigns until January. For Trump, DeSantis and the other Republican hopefuls, that will be after Iowa and New Hampshire have voted and likely knocked some of them out of the field — if they have the money to make it that far.

The reports reflect a critical stretch of the campaign from July through September, a period that includes two GOP primary debates, two new Trump indictments and the start of a Biden battleground-state ad blitz that began in late summer and has continued apace into the fall.

Here are five key takeaways from a fundraising period that showed us who’s up, who’s down and who’s barely hanging on:

1. President Joe Biden’s campaign ramped up quickly

Three months ago, people in Biden’s orbit touted their lean campaign, bragging about spending only $1.1 million in the second quarter of this year and having only four staffers on the payroll.

Things have changed quickly.

Biden’s campaign spent $12.7 million in the third quarter — a more than tenfold increase — much of it to pay for an early advertising effort to boost his sagging poll numbers.

Biden spent nearly $9 million to make and air his campaign spots from July through September, and that spending has continued unabated since. His campaign is still spending more than $1 million a week, on average, to run ads in battleground states, with more than a year to go until the election.

The president is also building out his staff, going from four people at the end of June to 38 paychecks issued in the final round of payroll last month.

For the quarter, Biden’s campaign raised $24.8 million, though his team claimed a combined $71 million haul across his various fundraising vehicles and the Democratic National Committee. That was slightly more than Trump raised last quarter, but the best apples-to-apples comparison comes up short of what Trump’s campaign raised ($41 million) and spent ($14.5 million) in the third quarter of 2019, the year before he ran for reelection.

2. Trump has tons of money, but it costs a lot to raise those funds

Trump’s campaign reported $24.5 million raised in the third quarter, more than double any other candidate in the GOP primary. The former president maintains his commanding lead over the field in just about every way, including fundraising.

But the number on his latest FEC report is much smaller than the $45 million figure his campaign touted earlier this month that was raised by his joint fundraising committee, which is his primary fundraising entity.

The joint fundraising committee sends 90 percent of its net proceeds — the leftover money after covering fundraising expenses — to Trump’s campaign, while 10 percent goes to Save America, his leadership PAC. For the campaign to receive only about 54 percent of what the joint fundraising committee said it raised, the joint fundraising committee must be spending a lot on fundraising expenses. That tracks with what we already knew: Over the first six months of the year, 38 percent of what the joint fundraising committee raised went toward its own expenditures, not Trump’s campaign or his leadership PAC.

The joint fundraising committee does not have to file with the FEC until January, so the specifics of its expenses will be murky until then. But the former president’s latest filing suggests that — while his team touted strong fundraising driven by merchandise around his Georgia mugshot — he continues to have to spend a lot to raise a lot.

3. DeSantis cut back on spending. Will it help him sway donors — and voters?

The Florida governor was burning through cash in the first few months of his campaign, but appears to have cut back as the quarter went on. No more spending on private jets in the final weeks of September, and the number of staff on payroll dropped 30 percent from the beginning of the quarter to the end.

The leaner campaign could appeal to big donors who may be contemplating cutting checks to DeSantis and want to ensure their money will go to good use. But it is also a recognition that his campaign overextended in the early going.

Downsizing will help balance the books, but DeSantis is still looking to win votes.

There is still no shortage of money supporting his candidacy. The super PAC behind him, Never Back Down, had $97 million in the bank a few months ago. But for DeSantis’ operation, the past few months were a time of change without obvious polling gains. The question is whether the adjustments will start to pay electoral dividends in the coming months.

4. Three GOP candidates have similar cash on hand — but they are trending in different directions

Cash on hand, the amount of money in a campaign’s bank account, is an important sign of candidates’ longevity. Those running low on cash, like former Vice President Mike Pence — who had just $1.2 million at the end of September — risk not having enough money to sustain a campaign through to the Iowa caucuses.

Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina leads the rest of the pack in terms of cash on hand, with $13.3 million, while DeSantis reported $12.3 million and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley reported $11.6 million in the bank.

But each of those come with caveats. Perhaps the biggest is for DeSantis — only $5 million of his cash can be used for the primary. The rest, from big donors, is reserved for the general. The South Carolinians are hurt a bit by that, too, but less so: Scott has about $11.7 million available for the primary, while Haley sits on $9.1 million she can use.

That would seem to give an advantage to Scott. But his cash total is not exactly the result of prodigious presidential fundraising; the South Carolina senator had $21 million cash on hand at the outset of his campaign, thanks to a massive transfer from his previous well-funded Senate campaign. But he spent $7.8 million more than he raised in the third quarter, which does not suggest financial sustainability.

On the flip side, Haley has steadily grown her cash on hand number every quarter since her campaign launch. Her campaign spent only $3.5 million over the past three months while taking in more than $8 million.

5. Democrats have the early money edge in Senate races, but will it last?

Democrats’ 51-49 Senate majority is in grave danger next year, but the party’s incumbents are building extensive cash reserves to defend seats in difficult territory.

Two of them — Sens. Sherrod Brown of Ohio ($5.8 million) and Jon Tester of Montana ($5 million) — raised more than $5 million for races in states Trump carried in the last presidential election by significant margins. Sens. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania ($3.2 million) and Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin ($3.1 million) raised over $3 million each in states Biden closely won. And the party’s likely nominee in Michigan, another perennial battleground state, Rep. Elissa Slotkin, also raised just under $3 million.

In fact, except Arizona, where Sen. Kyrsten Sinema is still deciding whether she’ll seek a second term after changing her party affiliation from Democrat to independent, the leading Democratic incumbent or candidate in every competitive seat the party currently holds has a cash-on-hand advantage of at least $4 million over the top-funded GOP hopeful.

In Michigan, Slotkin has about $4.4 million more than former GOP Rep. Mike Rogers. In Nevada, first-term Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen has $8.8 million to Republican Sam Brown’s $938,000.

But some of those on-paper numbers may overstate the party’s financial edge. For example, Casey ended September with $7.4 million in the bank — but Republican Dave McCormick just burned through $14.4 million of his own money in his unsuccessful bid for Pennsylvania’s other Senate seat last year and could self-fund again in this race.

Republican challengers got off to an uneven start. Tim Sheehy, the party’s top recruit in Montana, had a good quarter, raising $2.9 million, with $653,000 of that coming from his own wallet. But Sheehy still trails Tester by nearly $12 million, and he could face a costly primary against Rep. Matt Rosendale, who is undecided on the race but was the party’s 2018 nominee against Tester.

Similarly, Republicans have two self-funders in Ohio, Bernie Moreno and Matt Dolan, who each have at least $5 million in the bank to take on Brown. But they’ll likely use a good chunk of that in next spring’s primary, in which Secretary of State Frank LaRose is also running after raising $1 million last quarter.

Democrats’ most vulnerable seat is undoubtedly in West Virginia, where incumbent Sen. Joe Manchin’s fundraising slowed. He still has $11.3 million in cash on hand if he chooses to run for another term. That’s way more than either of his Republican opponents, though GOP Gov. Jim Justice may have the capability to self-fund.